Seven years of writing Rust, TypeScript, and Solidity. Same desk, same tempo, every day. This isn't a technical post. But I think the lesson behind it might be the most important thing I've learned as an engineer.
This morning, I woke up, stared at the ceiling, and thought:
"I've been at this for seven years. Why do I still feel like I'm not moving forward?"
Every day I write code. I draft ideas. I meet people. I return to my desk. There hasn't been a single day I quit. And yet, in the soft morning light, there are moments when I genuinely lose track of where I'm standing.
Maybe you have mornings like this too.
You're moving, but you don't feel it.
You're shipping, but it doesn't register.
This is a story about that kind of morning.
Chapter 1 | At Eleven, I Walked Out of School
When I was eleven, I left my public school in Shinjuku.
I couldn't articulate the reason in a child's vocabulary. The closest words I have now are these:
"This isn't where I'm supposed to be."
The lining up. The identical smiles we were trained to wear. The single answer everyone was supposed to write. My spirit never made peace with that place.
My parents were stunned. My teachers were troubled. I left anyway.
From that day on, my life carried the weight of "I decide for myself."
Chapter 2 | Ages 18–23, I Was Insufferable
From eighteen to twenty-three, I was an arrogant fool.
At eighteen, I started building organizations. They became companies. The headcount grew. The money grew. The sensation of something happening was enough to fill me up.
And then I got it completely wrong.
"How can you not even do this?"
I lost count of how many times I said it. I cut people down. I dismantled them with logic. I went cold on anyone who didn't meet my expectations. I genuinely believed I was the gifted one and everyone else just couldn't keep up.
I was leading a hundred people, and I held the heart of not a single one.
It took me a long time to see the truth.
The one who couldn't actually do anything was me.
Moving people is not the same as believing in them. Issuing orders is not the same as carrying responsibility.
The arrogant always fall. It's only a question of when.
Chapter 3 | At 23, on a Hard Floor in Thailand
At twenty-three, I was in Thailand.
I had lost almost everything. The organization. The money. The relationships. My own faith in myself. Almost all of it.
I was crashing in what they call a catch house. The floor was hard. The air conditioning didn't work. Only the pre-dawn air was strangely still.
Lying on that hard floor, eyes open, I made a vow.
No more meaningless money.
I was done living a life of half-measure profits and predictable failures.
I will build something everyone can respect — something that lasts.
I will become the real thing. No other path is permitted.
And then I made another vow.
There were people who believed in me when there was no reason to. I will repay these people with the rest of my life. That flag, I would never lower.
After that, I started going to a Buddhist temple nearby. I sat on tatami, closed my eyes, and just counted breaths. The first few days, the screaming in my head wouldn't stop. I kept sitting anyway. Every day.
It took a while for the soil to crack and the water beneath to come through.
Chapter 4 | Seven Invisible Years
That's where the seven invisible years began.
There were no fireworks. Almost no moments worth posting. The corner of a coworking space. The window seat at a library. The hotel desk at midnight. The locations changed; the work never did.
Morning meditation. A walk with English and Mandarin in my ears. Back to the desk. Code.
There were days when a single bug ate the entire day. A full twenty-four hours, not a line of progress. "What did I even do today?" I'd think, and turn off the light.
On a good day, I'd ship one feature. One. A small improvement no one would ever notice. But that was the only road forward, and I had to walk it.
One night, I told myself something I still remember:
"This is a war that has no end. And it's a war I cannot quit."
If there's no end, sprinting is pointless. If you can't quit, you can't burn out. So every day, sit at the same tempo. Walk at the same tempo. Write at the same tempo.
When asked what for?, the answer was already settled.
Someone, once, believed in me. That alone was enough.
From the outside, it must have looked like I was stuck. Inside, something was being assembled with absolute certainty. Like roots quietly spreading underground.
No dramatic breakthroughs.
Just sitting, every morning.
Just shipping, every day.
Chapter 5 | When Personal Gratitude Became Love for a Culture and the Earth
In the beginning, my motive was deeply personal.
The vow I'd made on that hard floor in Thailand, to repay a small handful of people. I thought that was all this was about.
But somewhere in those years of writing code and meditating and walking, something began to expand.
The faces of the people I owed started to blur into more faces. Behind a mentor, I could see the land that raised him. Behind the land, I could see the festivals, the shrines, the unnamed ancestors who had built it all over centuries.
One day it hit me.
The debt I want to repay is no longer the size of one human being.
The one I owe is Japan itself. The nature that gave birth to Japan. The earth that has nurtured that nature.
Then the words came.
Musubi. The ancient Japanese principle of binding what was once separated.
Matsuri DAO. Inheriting matsuri — the oldest DAO in human history, a thousand years deep — through the technology of our time. The ujiko membership system at every Shinto shrine, the kō savings circles, the flow of celebratory offerings — all of it was already a DAO archetype.
Two resolutions then crystallized.
Onko-chishin. To find the new, you must first revisit the old, deeply. Master a thousand years of Japan before designing the future.
Seishin-itto, nanigoto ka narazaran. When the spirit converges on a single point, nothing is impossible. Technology, organization, market timing — everything ultimately returns to this.
The vow on the floor in Thailand and Matsuri DAO live on the same line.
Personal gratitude became gratitude to a culture, which became gratitude to the earth.
Chapter 6 | And Yet, I'm Still Standing at the Gate
So we come back to this morning.
The morning when I wondered, "Am I actually moving forward?"
Seven years of sitting. Seven years of writing. Seven years of waiting. And still, this morning, my heart wavered.
But I got out of bed, sat down at my desk, and realized:
I am, right now, standing at the gate.
Seven years ago, the gate was far away. I couldn't even make out its shape through the haze. Now it's right in front of me. Close enough that I can reach out and feel the grain of the wood.
This past year, I've found myself at the same table as some of the world's top players. People at the frontier of the blockchain industry. Founders who are seriously trying to move culture. The inspiration I've received from them is immeasurable.
I have, at last, reached the starting line.
The seven years were preparation. The race begins now.
And this time, I will not repeat the same mistakes.
From here, I go out into the world.
A Note for Engineers
If there's one thing seven years of writing code every day taught me, it's this: the language spec is never the hardest part. The tempo is.
Not Rust's borrow checker. Not Solidity gas optimization. Not TypeScript type puzzles.
The hardest engineering problem I've ever faced was whether to open the editor again on the night a single bug ate my entire day.
Building software is the daily, gradual assembly of an abstract structure. It is closer to prayer than people admit. The line you commit today — you have no idea how it will compound tomorrow. But if you don't commit it, nothing happens.
If you've lost the feeling of moving forward, it might just be that what you're building is bigger than your own line of sight. Commit every day, and you will reach the gate. I'm telling you this after seven years. You can trust it.
The mornings when you don't feel like you're moving — those are probably the mornings you are closest to the gate.
I'll see you at the gate.
Ko Takahashi
CEO, Jon & Coo Inc. / Founder, Matsuri DAO
ko-takahashi.jp
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